As you read in my previous post, Big Easy Shrimp, I am starting a quest to add some new cooking to our regular routine.  You saw that Part I was to cook some international and regional cuisine.

Part II is to try to cook different meals from actual cookbooks.  We have a whole shelf of cookbooks, many of them never even opened beyond the first day they were received.  Growing up in the “information age” I think of something to cook, google it, and sift through the thousands of recipes online.  While that works when I specifically have something in mind, it doesn’t help me to expand the ideas — a problem none of you will soon have because you can just come here for new ideas!

So, I started this one with the smallest cookbooks first (I know, the easiest, but I have to start somewhere).  This recipe for Salmon Cakes came from the Pampered Chef Season’s Best Recipe Collection of Spring/Summer 2007.  You will soon notice that my dinners almost always come with a reason, maybe rational only to me, but a reason nonetheless.  This one was a perfect recipe for us at the time because we had a huge piece of Costco salmon, and after one day of grilled salmon, we decided another preparation would be best — thus the Salmon Cakes.  They made a huge mess in the kitchen, but were absolutely excellent and seemed like something from a coastal restaurant.  I only made two small changes from the recipe; I used cajun seasoning instead of the prescribed Jamaican Jerk seasoning (only because we had the former and not the latter), and used the optional mango instead of papaya (it was hard enough to find a decent mango around here).

The recipe says 12 servings, but I believe that is appetizer size.  A half recipe made dinner for 2 of us.  I highly suggest trying this recipe as either an appetizer or entree, and as always, please let me know how it goes.

Salmon Cakes with Papaya Sauce

Poached Salmon

• 1 lemon, divided
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 pound boneless, skinless salmon filet

Papaya Sauce

• 1 large papaya or mango
• 1/2 medium red bell pepper
• 2 tablespoons apricot preserves
• 1 garlic clove, pressed
• 1 green onion with top, thinly sliced

Salmon Cakes

• 1 1/3 cups fresh bread crumbs
• 2 teaspoons Jamaican Jerk rub
• 1/2 cup finely chopped celery
• 2 green onions with tops, thinly sliced
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
• 1 garlic clove, pressed
• Lemon vest from poached salmon
• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1.  For poached salmon, zest lemon to measure 1 teaspoon zest; set aside for salmon cakes.  Thinly slice lemon.  Combine lemon slices, bay leaf, 3 cups water, and salt; bring to a boil.  Add salmon.  Cover; reduce heat and simmer 4-5 minutes or until outside of salmon is opaque and center is pink.  Remove salmon from skillet and set aside.

2.  For papaya sauce, cut papaya in half lengthwise; remove seeds.  Scoop flesh into bowl; reserve one papaya shell.  Add bell pepper, preserves, garlic, and green onion to bowl.  Spoon sauce into reserved papaya shell; set aside.

3.  For salmon cakes, combine 1 cup of the bread crumbs and jerk rub in shallow dish; set aside.  Break salmon into chunks.  Combine salmon, remaining 1/3 bread crumbs, celery, green onions, egg, mayonnaise, garlic and reserved lemon zest.  Using a scoop, place 1 scoop of the salmon mixture into bread crumb mixture; flatten slightly and coat both sides with bread crumbs.  Shake off excess.  Repeat with remaining salmon mixture for a total of 12 cakes.

4.  Heat oil in clean skillet over medium-high heat until hot; add salmon cakes.  Cook 4-6 minutes or until golden brown, turning once.  Serve with papaya sauce.

Yields 12 servings

- Clarissa

aka “New Orleans Shrimp with Midwest ingredients”

I like to think I am a decent cook.  I’ve never had formal training of any kind, but spent years watching my mom produce quality meals day after day that rarely seemed to be repetitive.  Now that it’s my turn, I find I cook exactly the same.  There are certainly good aspects from learning by example, but the downside is that I now cook straight-up Midwestern meals just like my mom, who cooks Midwestern meals probably just like her mom.

Now there’s certainly nothing wrong with that, but Part One of a quest of mine over the coming [insert whatever time period you'd like because I really don't have one] is to try to cook different types of cuisine.  I hope to create some international dishes as well as dishes simply from other parts of our own country.  The hard part of that quest for me is not so much finding the ideas but actually planning far enough ahead to purchase the ingredients (that most likely are not already in my Midwestern kitchen).  We’ll see how it goes and, of course, I’ll keep you updated on my progress.

This first step on the quest began with a South Beach Diet email I received.  I’ve never actually tried the diet, but I’ve found they often have some good recipes (in my opinion, usually reached by substituting the full-fat versions of ingredients ).  The email I received was for “Big Easy Shrimp” and I was surprised to see it used ingredients that I already had.  So begins my quest.  It got rave reviews from the food critic, not only as a good meal, but as one to add to the repertoire (that’s another level of “rave review” from him).

As for recipe changes I made…  I obviously (being married to a pork man) used “real” bacon instead of the recipe’s turkey bacon.  I also burnt it a little (which I wouldn’t suggest) but that caused me to remove some of the grease (which I would suggest if you’re using the real stuff).  There seemed to be plenty of bacon flavor in the dish, so I would be worried leaving all the grease would be overboard even for bacon lovers like us.  I served it over brown rice and it made for a great dinner dish.

Give it a try for something different, and please let me know how it goes and how you made it your own!

Big Easy Shrimp

Description

Here’s an easy way to get a taste of the Big Easy. Serve this traditional shrimp creole dish over brown rice to turn this into a Phase 2 dinner. If you like, you can substitute sea scallops for the shrimp.

Serves 4

Ingredients
2 strips turkey bacon or Canadian bacon
1 onion, chopped
1/2 green bell pepper, chopped
1 celery stalk
1 clove garlic, minced
1 can (16 ounces) chopped tomatoes with juice
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon hot-pepper sauce
1 pound medium shrimp, peeled and deveined

Instructions
Cook the bacon in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat until crisp. Place on a paper towel–lined plate. Crumble when cool. Leave any drippings in the skillet.

In the skillet, over medium heat, cook the onion, bell pepper, and celery for 5 minutes, or until tender. Stir in the garlic and cook for 1 minute. Add the tomatoes (with juice), bay leaf, black pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and hot-pepper sauce. Heat to boiling. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes. Add the shrimp and bacon and cook for 5 minutes, or until the shrimp turn pink. Remove and discard the bay leaf before serving.

- Clarissa

Welcome!  I’m so happy you’ve come to check out the site.  I call myself the Next Generation Housewife because I am a modern young-ish woman who loves to keep up with activities around our household.

I believe the modern “Next Generation” housewife is a strong woman interested in improving her household and the lives of those in it.  Although historically the term “housewife” pertained to a woman who worked only in and around the house, I believe the new generation of housewives are those working IN the house, FROM the house, and OUT of the house — all sharing the desire to make life wonderful for ourselves and our families.

So, who am I?  I’m a Midwestern 20-something girl living with my wonderful husband of almost 2 years and our cat.  I’ve got an education in Industrial Engineering and a career as an Information Technology consultant.  I currently work from home in my personal Web design business, Aclaris, do some virtual consulting, and manage our household.

I enjoy working around the house with cooking, baking, sewing, and decorating, but also like to indulge my nerdy side by keeping up with the latest technologies, fixing things around the house, and making massive spreadsheets on just about everything.  I know most people wouldn’t call creating spreadsheets a hobby, but what do they know?  I also just started learning to decorate cakes, so I’m sure you’ll hear about that from time to time as well.

On this site I will share my adventures in marriage and the activities described above in hopes of inspiring my fellow NGHs.  For you more seasoned readers out there, I hope you will share some of your knowledge on the topics with us, in addition to finding some comic relief in my trials and errors (because there will most certainly be errors).  I’m not an expert in hardly anything I do, but I love to learn and have fun along the way.

Over the next few days we’ll catch up with some of the different projects I have going on and talk about where we hope to go from there.  Be sure to subscribe today so you don’t miss a moment of the adventure!

- Clarissa